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CbirD H)fnner, 

fjbruarie 16, ISOO. 

THE SPANISH WAR; 

A PROPHECY OR AN EXCEPTIOX ? 

BY THE HONORABLE DAVID J. BREWER, 
ASSOCIATE JUSTICE OF THE SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES. 

Mr. President and Gentlemen of The Liberal 
Club : 

On the 1 8th day of April, 1898, Congress, by an 
overwhelming vote, passed this resolution : 

" Joint resolution for the recognition of the inde- 
pendence of the people of Cuba, demanding that the 
Government of Spain relinquish its authority and 
government in the island of Cuba, and to withdraw 
its land and naval forces from Cuba and Cuban 
waters, and directing the President of the United 
States to use the land and naval forces of the United 
States to carry these resolutions into effect. 

" Whereas, the abhorrent conditions which have 
existed for more than three years in the island of 
Cuba, so near our own borders, have shocked the 
moral sense of the people of the United States, have 
been a disgrace to Christian civilization, culminating, 
as they have, in the destruction of a United States 
battleship, with 265 of its officers and crew, while on 
a friendly visit in the harbor of Havana, and can- 

I 




> 2 Tl/E LIBERAL CLUB. 

r^ not longer be endured, as has been set forth by the 
<^"^ President of the United States in his message to 

Congress of April ii, 1898, upon which the action of 
Congress was invited ; therefore, 

" Resolved, By the Senate and House of Repre- 
sentatives of the United States of America, in Con- 
gress assembled : 

"First. — That the people of the island of Cuba 
are, and of right ought to be, free and independent. 

" Second. — That it is the duty of the United 
States to demand, and the Government of the United 
States does hereby demand, that the Government of 
Spain at once relinquish its authority and govern- 
ment in the island of Cuba and withdraw its land 
and naval forces from Cuba and Cuban waters. 

" Third.— That the President of the United States 
be, and he hereby is, directed and empowered to use 
the entire land and naval forces of the United States, 
and to call into the actual service of the United 
States the militia of the several States, to such extent 
as may be necessary to carry these resolutions into 
effect. 

" Fourth.— That the United States hereby dis- 
claims any disposition or intention to exercise sover- 
eignty, jurisdiction or control over said island, except 
for the pacification thereof, and asserts its determina- 
tion, when that is accomplished, to leave the govern- 
ment and control of the island to its people. 

"Approved, April 20, 1898." 



\ 



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THE SPANISH WAR. 3 

This was the official declaration by the Nation of 
its purpose in commencing the recent war. If there- 
upon Spain had withdrawn its troops from Cuba and 
left the people of the island free to establish their 
own government there would have been no war. And 
when as the result of the conflict Spain relinquished 
all dominion and control of Cuba and left her people 
free, the purpose of the war was accomplished. 

It were going too far to say that the philanthropic 
motive of emancipating Cuba was the sole cause of 
the war. Other matters tended more or less directly 
to precipitate the collision. Cuba had been for years 
in a state of chronic disturbance. Its unsettled con- 
dition had seriously interfered with our commercial 
relations with the island and pecuniarily damaged 
our interests. The fearful catastrophe of the destruc- 
tion of the " Maine " intensified an already growing 
feeling. The cool, dispassionate statement of Senator 
Proctor, reciting the horrors which he had seen, more 
potent than all the tempestuous utterances of those 
jingo orators who shouted for war, but never enlisted, 
strengthened the conviction that something ought to 
be done. And then the varied interests which always 
hope to profit either pecuniarily or in the line of 
military or naval glory by any war kept steadily work- 
ing toward the same result. Yet, while all these 
matters are to be taken into account in determining 
the causes of the war, the fact remains that the main 
thought — the officially declared purpose — was the 



4 THE LIBERAL CLUB. 

relief of an oppressed people. And that purpose 
ought never to be forgotten. "Whether facts were 
distorted, cruelties exaggerated, the real conditions 
misrepresented, whether, indeed, the emergency had 
arisen which called for interference, are matters which 
may be disputed and debated, but it should never be 
forgotten that the American people believed that the 
emergency had arisen, that humanity demanded inter- 
ference, and undertook the war to put an end to 
cruelty and wrong and for the emancipation of a 
struggling and down-trodden people. 

When the war had commenced it was waged as 
other wars, and this country struck where it could, 
and as hard as it could. We aimed at the solar plexus, 
and we hit it. The proud Castillian Corbett went 
down, and victory is ours. 

Out of this war have sprung questions affecting 
the future history and policy of this country, ques- 
tions condensed in that which I have selected as the 
title of this talk : " The War With Spain ; a Prophecy 
or an Exception ?" The questions which I wish to 
notice are two in number, and may be stated thus : 
First, because we undertook the deliverance of the 
oppressed Cubans from the domination of Spain 
are we hereafter to assume the duty of forcibly 
emancipating all oppressed peoples or were the cir- 
cumstances surrounding our interference in Cuban 
affairs such as to make that simply an exception in 
our history and policy ? Secondly, are we to extend 



THE SPANISH WAR. 5 

our dominion by force, purchase or otherwise over 
remote territory and enter upon that career of colonial 
expansion which has become the settled habit of the 
great European nations, or are we to remain content 
with our compact continental possessions and devote 
our energies to the development of our own resources 
and the building up of the United States of America 
within those limits along the lines of our past 
history ? 

The questions thus presented are vital and far- 
reaching. They are not to be settled dogmatically ; 
by epithet or by denunciation ; not by saying that 
what has been must be, and that changed conditions 
bring no change in duty or policy ; nor, on the other 
hand, that because we are powerful, and can do so, it 
is destiny and duty that we should. Cant phrases do 
not change convictions or determine right, and the 
American people are not ruled by an epigram. For- 
tunately, these questions are being discussed without 
reference to party lines, and in the most earnest, pat- 
riotic and thoughtful manner by all. 

Returning to the first question, it must be noticed 
that if the circumstances demanded any outside 
interference in the affairs of Cuba (and that they did 
the general consensus of opinion in this country 
asserted), then we were so situated that it would seem 
to have been our special duty to interfere ; we were 
the near Samaritan. I know there are some who say 
that there is no duty of a nation as of an individual 



6 THE LIBERAL CLUB. 

to act the part of a Samaritan ; that a nation, although 
an aggregation of individuals, is somehow or other 
relieved of all obligations which rest upon an indi- 
vidual ; that it is not only its privilege, but its duty, 
to be guided in all respects by selfishness ; that no 
matter what cry of appeal may come from far or near, 
it is the nation's right to measure its duty, not by any 
questions of humanity, but by the mere rule of dollars 
and cents. To those who entertain such views of 
national right and duty any interference for the mere 
sake of relieving an oppressed people is necessarily 
an exception — one to be discountenanced and never 
followed. 

I do not agree with those views. A nation is, in 
my judgment, a great moral entity, expressing in its 
life the sum of all the moral obligations which rest 
upon its individual citizens, and so there are times in 
the history of every nation when humanity calls upon 
it to look beyond the mere matter of dollars and 
cents, and even at personal sacrifice to interfere in the 
affairs of other nations. And yet, because this 
national duty may sometimes arise, and when it arises 
should always be bravely met, it does not follow 
therefrom that there is a continuous obligation to be 
looking into the affairs of other nations to see if there 
are not wrongs that ought to be righted, oppressed 
that should be delivered and struggling people set 
free. The good Samaritan did not go down on the 
road from Jerusalem to Jericho hunting a job, but as 



THE SPAXISH WAR. 7 

he journeyed on his own business came where the 
robbed and beaten sufferer lay. It is not mere selfish- 
ness which declares that the primary duty of a nation 
is to its own people and that their interests and well- 
being are not to be neglected under the illusive 
notion that it has a duty to pose as a great national 
rectifier of wrongs done by other nations. It is a 
wise man that successfully manages his own house- 
hold, that has primary regard for the well-being of 
its inmates, and, although he may not selfishly ignore 
the condition of affairs of other households, yet he 
ought always to remember his primary duty and be 
cautious about interfering in the affairs of others. 
Everyone knows that a man who is a busybody in 
other people's affairs, although animated by the best 
of motives, is as apt to do harm as good. He often 
fails to appreciate the real situation, interferes in 
behalf of the wrong party, or interferes when inter- 
ference is a curse ; and the same is true of nations. 

Neither is there anything in the so-called " Monroe 
Doctrine " which makes us sponsor for this continent. 
We have no supervision or control over the internal 
affairs of other States ; we are not their guardians. 
Each of them has the same right to interfere in the 
affairs of the United States that we have to interfere 
in its. That doctrine finds its expression in the 
message of President Monroe to Congress on Decem- 
ber 2, 1823, which, after referring to the difference 
between the political system which obtains across the 



8 THE LIBERAL CLUB. 

waters and that of this country, states the right which 
we claim in these words : 

" We owe it, therefore, to candor and to the amic- 
able relations existing between the United States and 
those Powers to declare that we should consider 
any attempt on their part to extend their system to 
any portion of this hemisphere as dangerous to our 
peace and safety. With the existing colonies or 
dependencies of any European Power we have not 
interfered, and shall not interfere. But with the 
governments who have declared their independence 
and maintained it, and whose independence we have, 
on great consideration and on just principles, acknowl- 
edged, we could not view any interposition for the 
purpose of oppressing them or controlling in any 
other manner their destiny, by any European Power, 
in any other light than as the manifestation of an 
unfriendly disposition towards the United States." 

This means only that we are unwilling that the 
political system of Europe shall be extended in 
America. We pledge non-interference with existing 
colonies of European governments ; we simply state 
that their ideas of government and colonial expansion 
must not be worked out on this hemisphere. 

Whether this doctrine has been so far approved as to 
become a rule of international law is one thing ; it may 
simply have been acquiesced in because of no suitable 
occasion for challenge. At best it is but an expres- 
sion, not of authority over this continent, but simply of 



THE SPANISH WAR. 9 

protection and defense. It is a declaration of a 
purpose to stand by our weaker neighbors in case of 
attack and in no sense an assumption of a control 
over their affairs. Neither have we since that mes- 
sage enlarged its scope. When Great Britain de- 
manded reparation from Nicaragua and threatened 
force to compel compliance, we did not interfere. In 
the controversy between Venezuela and Great Britain 
we took no new position. The former government 
claimed that the latter was trying to enlarge its 
territory wrongfully and forcibly by taking possession 
of that which rightfully belonged to Venezuela. We 
interfered only so far as to say that Great Britain 
should not forcibly extend its colonial possessions ; 
and the outcome has been an arbitration between the 
two nations for the purpose of settling the question 
of right. 

But the second question is of more importance, for 
I think it may be safely assumed that there is in the 
American people such a spirit of humanity and sense 
of responsibility that whenever there shall arise a 
real emergency for interference in the name of 
humanity in the affairs of another nation we shall 
respond with alacrity, and there is also such a general 
prudence and caution as will keep us from unwar- 
ranted and needless interference. And this second 
question is one whose solution will materially affect 
our destiny. Happily, the war with Spain is ended, 
and the results of the war determined. Grim-visaged 



lO THE LIBERAL CLUB. 

War hath smoothed its wrinkled front. As there 
were some who doubted in the beginning its wisdom 
or necessity, so there are some who doubt whether 
the results will be beneficial, and whether it was wise 
to take the territory which the Nation has taken. 
But the thing is accomplished, and it is no part of a 
patriot to stand aloof and simply denounce. Rather 
let him accept that which has been accomplished and 
apply himself as best he may to make the things 
accomplished fruitful of the least injury and produc- 
tive of the most blessing. Yet, while so doing, it is 
right and wise to consider what shall be the future, 
and whether that which has been done shall become 
the fixed habit and settled policy of the Nation. 
What has been done is one thing. What shall be is 
another. We have taken islands separated from us 
by the waters of the ocean. Are we thus to con- 
tinually expand ? Is such a policy of expansion wise ? 
In criticising this policy I shall consider only the 
Philippines. I take them as illustrations, because the 
truth is better seen by its connection with a concrete 
fact than through any mere general statement. And 
if I refer only to the arguments against the appropri- 
ation of those islands, and fail to notice the many 
reasons or the peculiar circumstances which induced 
the action of our Government, it is not because I do 
not appreciate the force of those reasons and circum- 
stances, but because, as I said, I am not here to com- 
plain of that which has been done. I despise a man 



THE SPANISH WAR. jj 

who simply sulks and swears. My thought is : accept- 
ing that which has been done as having been the best 
under the circumstances, is that to become the future 
policy of the Nation ? Is it a prophecy or an excep- 
tion ? 

One thing which seemed to attract much attention, 
and was claimed to justify the taking possession of 
distant islands, is the need of coaling stations. When 
the question of annexing Hawaii was pending, distin- 
guished officers of both the Army and Navy appeared 
before committees of Congress, urging the necessity 
of securing a coaling station on those islands, and 
argued that we had better take the entire territory, 
which was small, and thus avoid the possibility of any 
other nation securing a post and base of operations 
contiguous to our own. Now, I do not propose to 
question the wisdom from a military standpoint of 
the advice given by those officers. I am ready to 
accept their statement that in case of war a coaling 
station there, or at the Philippine Islands, or else- 
where, is of value. I have had no military education ; 
I do not know how to conduct a war ; I do not edit a 
" yellow " journal ; and so I yield unquestioning assent 
to the claims made by these Army and Navy gentlemen 
that, in case of war, coaling stations in different parts of 
the globe are desirable. And yet, with the incredulity 
and questioning spirit of a Yankee, I cannot but 
notice that we have gotten along safely for an hun- 
dred years without any coaling stations outside of our 



12 THE LIBERAL CLUB. 

own territory, and I want to ask how much greater 
victory Dewey would have won if we had had a dozen 
coaling stations in the far Pacific ? And, further, it 
is clear that for a coaling station territory as large as 
New England is not essential. I know of but one place 
that needs such a large coaling station, and that is a 
place we all hope to eternally avoid. But, beyond 
that, is there not such a thing as overdoing this get- 
ting ready for war ? I have noticed that a man who 
goes about with a chip on his shoulder is very apt to 
have many quarrels, but the gentleman who minds 
his own business is ordinarily let alone and goes 
through life without a fight. 

Not that I believe in tamely submitting to every 
injury or insult, or that a nation, like an individual, 
does not sometimes have to assert itself, even to the 
extent of war. No more sacred duty rests upon the 
United States than to see that every citizen is pro- 
tected, wherever he may be, and to secure such pro- 
tection every dollar and every man within the limits 
of this country should stand pledged. I care not 
where an American may go, whether among the 
savage tribes in Africa, among the semi-civilized 
nations of Asia or in the higher civilized nations of 
Europe, it should be understood that the banner we 
love is a guarantee of safety which no nation or 
individual can trifle with. It is said that the lives 
and property of American citizens in Turkey have 
been wantonly destroyed. If that be true, repara- 



THE SPANISH WAR. 13 

tion should be demanded. And if that be refused, 
I would introduce Dewey to the Sultan before break- 
fast. And if beneath the fire of his guns the grand 
dome of the Mosque of St. Sophia tumbles into 
ruins, with all the picturesque splendor that attended 
the falling walls of the Temple of Jerusalem, I 
should only say, let all the world take warning and 
respect the Stars and Stripes. It is to the glory of 
this country that in its infancy it refused to pay 
tribute to the pirates of Algiers, and sent Decatur 
and others, who vanquished the pirates and com- 
pelled respect to our flag. And I care not how often, 
if necessary, that lesson of the sanctity of the Stars 
and Stripes is given. 

Many plans are suggested for the disposal of the 
Philippines. One is to withdraw our Army and Navy 
and leave the inhabitants to do the best they can for 
themselves. Another is to continue an armed force 
in possession for the purpose of preserving order until 
such time as the inhabitants have organized and put 
into active operation something like a stable govern- 
ment. Third, while leaving the control of internal 
affairs to the inhabitants to establish something in 
the nature of a protectorate — one that will guarantee 
peace within and protect against invasion from with- 
out. Fourth, to treat the islands as so much property 
and sell them for what we can get — selling to any 
responsible purchaser and one likely to establish good 
government in the islands. Fifth, to make them 



14 THE LIBERAL CLUB. 

colonies, to be governed by the United States, thus 
introducing into the life of this Nation the colonial 
system which obtains among European Powers. And 
sixth, to incorporate these islanders as fellow citizens, 
establishing therein at first territories with the view 
of subsequent admission into the Union as States. 
All these plans have their advocates. The air is full 
of argument advocating and challenging the wisdom, 
legality and constitutionality of each. I do not pro- 
pose to enter into any discussion of the legality or 
constitutionality of any of these plans. I assume that 
whatever the American people determine to do in 
reference to these islands they will. If new laws have 
to be enacted or constitutions amended, all is within 
the power of the people, for laws and constitutions, 
legislators, presidents and judges are but the means 
and agents by which the American people put into 
execution their deliberate purpose, and whatever that 
people determine to do they will do, and there is no 
power on earth that will or can stop them. Neither 
do I propose to say aught for or against the advis- 
ability of either of the first four plans suggested. 
The only matters I desire to consider are those involved 
in the last two propositions, namely, the introduction 
of the colonial system into this country and the hold- 
ing of these islands as colonies of the United States, 
or, on the other hand, the incorporation of the people 
of those islands into our nationality as citizens thereof, 
either by their direct admission as States or through 



THE SPANISH WAR. 15 

the intermediate process of territorial organization. 
Each of those propositions I believe freighted with peril 
and I am glad that the determination has been made 
to hold those questions open for deliberate considera- 
tion and not by hasty action to do that which once done 
might prove to be of lasting and irretrievable injury. 

And, first, of the colonial system. Confessedly it 
will be a departure in the history of this country — 
an as yet untried experiment. It is said that the 
Anglo-Saxon race has manifested a capacity to govern 
well ; that we are of that race and that, therefore, we 
could well govern those islands as colonies. India 
and Egypt are pointed to with pride as the achieve- 
ments of our race in the way of government. I do 
not question the capacity of the race on either side of 
the waters to well and wisely govern others. I object 
to it because it antagonizes the principles upon which 
this government was founded, which have controlled 
its life up to the present time, and the perfection of 
which has been the hope and aspiration of every true 
American. Those principles were expressed in the 
Declaration of Independence in these words : 

" We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all 
men are created equal, that they are endowed by their 
Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among 
these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. 
That to secure these rights governments are instituted 
among men, deriving their just powers from the con- 
sent of the governed." 



1 6 THE LIBERAL CLUB. 

Upon these immortal principles this Government 
was established, and we have again and again pro- 
claimed to the world that they are the foundations 
upon which this Government rests, and have appealed 
to our prosperity and success as evidence of the jus- 
tice of those principles. Somehow or other I still 
believe in the Declaration of Independence, and do 
not take kindly to a statement like the following in 
the September number of the Boston Congregation- 
alist : 

" The Rev. W. T. Perrin, one of the ablest of the 
Methodist clergymen of Boston, defended the annex- 
ation of Porto Rico, Hawaii and any other Spanish 
possessions, holding that the people of the country 
are realizing the absurdity of the clause in the Dec- 
laration of Independence which says that government 
derives its just powers from the consent of the gov- 
erned. . . . The logic of events has made it our 
duty to do so, and duty is greater than theory. Gov- 
ernment derives its powers from God, and God alone, 
and the nations are responsible to him." 

This assumption of divine authority has been the 
cry of every despot from Louis XIV., who said, " I 
am the state," to that madcap on the German throne, 
who is credited with saying, " Me und Gott." But 
with a diviner insight and a truer reverence we have 
believed that government derives its powers from the 
governed. I glory in the fact that my father was an 
old-line Abolitionist, and one thing which he instilled 



THE SPANISH WAR. 17 

into my youthful soul was the conviction that liberty, 
personal and political, is the God-given right of every 
individual, and I expect to live and die in that faith. 

I know that a Massachusetts lawyer years ago 
sneered at the Declaration of Independence as a 
collection of glittering generalities, but it takes the 
audacity of a Boston preacher to say in effect that the 
Declaration is a lie. It is true that during the cen- 
tury and a quarter of our existence our conduct has 
not been always on the plane of our avowed princi- 
ples. Very few nations, as very few individuals, live 
up to their high ideals, but surely this has been the 
ideal of our life, and we have striven to make it more 
and more real. The great war between the States 
was but an effort to make those principles more far 
reaching in their application, and every step forward 
along our history has been towards a more perfect 
realization of this ideal. Now, government by force 
is the very antipodes of this, and to introduce gov- 
ernment by force over any portion of the Nation is to 
start the second quarter of the second century of our 
life upon principles which are the exact opposite of 
those upon which we have hitherto lived. It is one 
thing to fail of reaching your ideal ; it is an entirely 
different thing to deliberately turn your back upon it. 
It is doubtless true that government by force often 
secures order and peace, but order and peace are not 
the only purpose of government. Order reigned at 
Warsaw. The test of government is not in the out- 



1 8 THE LIBERAL CLUB. 

ward mechanical display of order, but in the capacity 
to develop the best men, and we have lived in the 
faith that government by the consent of the governed 
develops the best men. We have not let the wise rule 
the ignorant, the learned the unlearned, the rich the 
poor, but we have appealed always to those whom 
Abraham Lincoln called "the plain people" as the 
ones in whose judgment to rely, and upon whose 
shoulders should rest the burden of government. 

Ideas are, after all, the eternal forces. Human life 
and destiny are controlled by them. They may seem 
to-day of little significance, but around them gather 
material interests and to-morrow their power is dis- 
closed. 

It is a universal law that no family or nation will 
prosper whose foundation ideas are not harmonious 
and consistent. If conflicting, there is nothing more 
certain than that trouble will follow. Our own his- 
tory furnishes a tremendous lesson in this direction. 
We commenced our national life declaring, as its 
foundation principle, that all men were created equal ; 
that they possessed inalienable rights — life, liberty 
and the pursuit of happiness. But we tolerated a 
conflicting thought. We attempted to limit our 
foundation principle to white men and deny it to 
black. It was a compromise. It seemed a small 
matter. The antagonism would disappear with time. 
But we forgot that ideas are living forces. 

William H. Seward divined the whole situation 



THE SPANISH WAR. 19 

when he affirmed an " irrepressible conflict." Abra- 
ham Lincoln saw the inevitable struggle when he 
declared that this Nation could not endure half slave 
and half free. And after nearly a century we paid 
the penalty in the awful sacrifice of the Civil War. 

Shall we forget the lesson of the past ? Shall we 
say it is a trifling matter to introduce into the life of 
this Nation, which affirms that government derives all 
its powers from the consent of the governed, the 
thought that that is true of only one race and not of 
all ? That the consent of the governed may be 
recognized for one portion and one race and repudi- 
ated for another portion and another race within the 
same dominion ? 

Government by consent and government by force, 
no matter how well the government may be adminis- 
tered, are two essentially antagonistic principles. 
Doubtless no immediate conflict will follow. We may 
see a large measure of prosperity ; but are we not 
sowing the seeds which in the days to come will 
grow up into a harvest of trouble for our children and 
our children's children 1 

The possibility is not changed by the unquestioned 
fact that the Anglo-Saxon race has the capacity for 
governing other races, nor by the singular prosperity 
which has attended England in her colonial system. 
In comparing the two nations it must be remembered 
that England's colonial system commenced when the 
king was one in fact as well as in name. The consent 



20 THE LIBERAL CLUB. 

of the governed was only a little factor in English 
life when she first reached out her hand to subdue 
and control other races. It was no more for the king 
to govern Canada and India than it was for him to 
govern England ; and, while the consent of the 
governed has been struggling and growing in Eng- 
land, it has not even yet become the single, dominant, 
controlling fact of that nation's life ; so that the 
antagonism between the two ideas of government by 
consent and government by force has never, in that 
empire, been fully developed. 

With us the case is different. We stand conse- 
crated to the single political idea of government by 
the consent of the governed. To introduce into the 
life of the Nation the other thought of government 
by force is, at the very outset, to precipitate a conflict 
which, sooner or later, must inevitably result in 
disaster. 

Neither have we been so successful in our treat- 
ment of dependent races in the past as to justify any 
exalted expectations for the future. We have called 
the Indian tribes the wards of the Nation, and our 
best citizens have striven from the beginning of the 
Government to the present time to secure to them 
their just rights, and with what result ? The eccen- 
tric Congressman from New Hampshire is credited 
with the statement that the Puritans marched among 
the Indians with a Bible in one hand and a rifle 
in the other. They converted those they could with 



THE SPANISH WAR. 2 1 

the one and disposed of the rest with the other. 
Helen Hunt has told the story of our dealings with 
these tribes in a book which she entitles " A Century 
of Dishonor." Are we entirely sure that a century of 
dishonor in respect to savages near at home will not 
be followed by a millennium of dishonor in respect to 
those beyond the seas ? 

To hear some talk you would think that all the 
influences going out from this Christian nation to the 
heathen have been Christian, purifying, elevating ; 
but the fact is that even from Puritan New England 
there have gone more hogsheads of rum than mission- 
aries, more gallons of whisky than Bibles. If anyone 
imagines that this will be changed when we come 
into control of the Philippines and attempt to rule 
them, that thereafter only missionaries and Bibles will 
pass thither from America, he sadly underrates the 
locomotive capacity of the Devil. 

Again, a necessity of colonial possessions is an 
increase in our Regular Army, and the first increase 
proposed is from 30,000 to 100,000 men. It is a 
strange commentary that at the close of the nine- 
teenth century the head of the most arbitrary govern- 
ment in the civilized world, the Czar of the Russias, 
is inviting the nations of the world to a decrease in 
their arms, while this, the freest land, is proposing an 
increase in its. Yet such seems to be the imperative 
need, if we enter upon the system of colonial expan- 
sion. We have lived and prospered for 123 years 



22 THE LIBERAL CLUB. 

with a handful of regular troops. We have preserved 
peace at home and have been respected abroad. 
Government by consent of the governed has little 
need of the soldier. So the world has come to 
believe, and so it is. Are we ready to forfeit this high 
position ? Do we not endanger the very foundation 
principles of this Government when we make the 
blare of the bugles and the tramp of the armed 
battalion the music which is heard on every side and 
the inspiration which attracts the ambition of our 
youth ? 

Another aspect of this question is worth noticing, 
and that is its relation to labor. We are facing in 
this country a difificult problem. The inventive 
spirit of our people is multiplying with marvelous 
rapidity labor-saving machines. By the use of them 
one or two skilled laborers will do the work hereto- 
fore done by many unskilled laborers. There is, 
therefore, a surplus of unemploj^ed labor. The 
machine is supplanting the man. We are facing the 
fact of an increasing amount of unemployed and 
unskilled labor. What shall be done ? China, with 
its enormous population, has sought to solve it by 
prohibiting the machine. Is that the best solution 
we can offer ? It has not a few advocates in our 
midst. The boycott put on the Oxley Stave Com- 
pany, which resulted in litigation, going up to the 
Court of Appeals, in the Eighth Circuit, was founded 
on the fact that the company introduced machines 



THE SPANISH WAR. 23 

into its manufactory for doing work which had there- 
tofore been done by hand. The complaint indorsed 
by the Federation of Labor against the United States 
superintendent of printing and engraving is of the 
same nature. Everywhere we hear a claim that the 
cleaning of streets must be done by hand labor 
instead of by machine. More than one labor body has 
protested against the employment of women. I 
am not here to indorse all these but simply to 
note the fact that labor realizes that it has a sur- 
plus, and is seeking to reduce it. Now, the great 
economic problem in this country is not how can a 
few men make more money and pile up larger 
fortunes ? But how can the great body of the people 
make a fair and comfortable living ? The right to work 
is again and again insisted upon as more important 
than the right to vote, and the cry of the right to 
work is supplemented by the cry that the State 
furnish work to all who cannot obtain it elsewhere. 
But the furnishing of work by the State means more 
taxation, and that implies added burdens on the 
employed to furnish support and sustenance to the 
unemployed. 

The problem is a serious one. We have 10,000,000 
or 12,000,000 of unskilled colored laborers south of 
Mason and Dixon's line, and we find the Governor 
of a great Northern State threatening to stand at its 
borders with Gatling guns and shoot down those 
laborers if they attempt to enter to compete with its 



24 THE LIBERAL CLUB. 

white laborers, and this in face of the constitutional 
provision that " the citizens of each State shall be 
entitled to all privileges and immunities of citizens 
in the separate States." Are we likely to aid in solv- 
ing this problem by bringing into our national life 
10,000,000 or 12,000,000 of unskilled Malay laborers ? 
We have shut the doors against the Chinese. Are 
they any worse than the Malay ? Shall we introduce 
in this Nation more cheap labor ? For labor is cheap 
where the cost of living is cheap, and the Malay 
needs but a little rice within his body and a little 
cotton cloth outside, and a very little rice and a very 
little cloth is sufficient. I do not wonder at the 
action of the Federation of Labor in protesting 
against a new competition of cheap labor as well as 
an increase of the Army, with its consequent increase 
of burden and taxation on the employed laborer. 

There is a frequent expression of the thought that 
this proposed expansion- will fill the mind of the 
Nation with new problems and new questions, and, 
therefore, turn its attention away from the problems 
and troubles which now embarrass us. I concede it, 
and if turning attention away from these interior 
problems would solve them it were well, but I am 
sure it will not bring solution. Giving liquor to a 
man may for the time being cause him to forget his 
troubles, but it does not end them, and when the 
period of intoxication is over the troubles reappear, 
and generally with added force. We cannot escape 



THE SPAiXISH WAR. 25 

these difficult problems of our internal life by looking 
out on the distant world. They are here and must 
be met and solved by patient, faithful, earnest atten- 
tion. We cannot get away from them. We must 
overcome them. We may postpone, but we only add 
to the difficulties thereby. 

But there is money in it. And after all this is 
really the most potent factor in the proposed reaching 
out after the islands of the Orient. The wealth of 
Ormus and of Ind is to-day as in the days of Mil- 
ton the expectation and the dream of many. Posses- 
sion of the Orient, with its accumulated wealth of 
centuries, dazzles the imagination and confuses the 
judgment. The haze of mystery hangs over that vast 
domain. Wealth untold is believed to be there, 
ready to be appropriated by any dominant power. 
All the nations and tribes come within Lord Salis- 
bury's definition of dying nations, and must soon be 
divided between and appropriated by the living and 
growing nations. China is held out as a dying nation, 
filled with inexhaustible wealth, and why should not 
we share in its appropriation ? What a picture this 
is ! The eagle of liberty standing like a buzzard to 
grow fat over an expected corpse. When a Washing- 
ton doctor of divinity the other day in conversation 
with the Chinese Minister, in reference to the posses- 
sion taken by Germany of part of her territory, said 
that it seemed to him that Russia and England were 
likely to follow the same example and appropriate 



26 THE LIBERAL CLUB. 

some Chinese territory, the sarcastic reply was, " Yes, 
that is the way Christian nations do." 

This matter of wealth has two sides to it. The 
poet says : 

' ' 111 fares the land to hastening ills a prey 
Where wealth accumulates and men decay." 

It is not true that a mere increase of wealth fore- 
shadows ruin and decay. It is not the possession of 
riches but the way in which they are accumulated 
that makes the menace. We have exported from 
this country in the last year $1,200,000,000 worth of 
our products. They were the fruit of our toil of 
hand and brain, and the increased wealth which flows 
into the land as a reward for such toil carries with it 
no menace, but the wealth which comes without an 
equivalent in toil of hand or brain is the wealth which 
threatens. Who is injured by money? Not the one 
that earns it day by day, dollar by dollar, and saves 
until he accumulates a fortune, but he who by the 
chance discovery of a mine, or an accidental speculation 
in stocks, finds himself changed from poverty to sud- 
den wealth ; and that which is true of the individual is 
true of the nation. Whatever it accumulates by hon- 
est toil is not a curse. Whatever it obtains without 
giving value may be fruitful of injury. Exchanging 
bright colored but cheap calicoes for furs and jewels 
may rapidly pile up wealth, but such wealth is more 
apt to curse than to bless. 

This idea of the Nation going into the midst of 



THE SPANISH WAR. 27 

races and people where things of value have been 
heaped up during the centuries, and are possessed by 
those ignorant of their value, and appropriating those 
things, either by force or in exchange for cheap 
trinkets and gewgaws, is one filled with danger. The 
Caisars saw the spears of their victorious legions 
flash in the sunlight of every known land, and in their 
triumphant return they brought with them the accu- 
mulated wealth of all the nations they had subdued. 
The splendor of imperial Rome outshone the world, 
but the wealth thus obtained without value given 
undermined the empire and the glory of Rome is 
simply a memory. Napoleon beheld the shining star 
of destiny ; and then ? Does human nature change 
through the centuries ? We stand to-day facing the 
temptation which comes from the possibility of rap- 
idly accumulated wealth. What right have we to 
anticipate that the same result will not follow if we 
pursue the same course of taking what we have not 
fully earned ? 

Again, this reaching out to the Orient is an implied 
repudiation of the Monroe Doctrine, and exposes to 
additional perils and complications and possible wars 
with European nations. The scope of that doctrine 
I have already indicated. We have shouted ourselves 
hoarse in its praise and declared our willingness to 
fight in vindication of its principles if necessary. 

It declares that we oppose any interference by 
European nations with states on this continent, any 



28 THE LIBERAL CLUB. 

appropriation here of additional territory by those 
nations ; in other words, we practically said that the 
Powers of the Eastern Hemisphere must keep off the 
Western ; that in this continent the problem of 
government of and by and for the people was being 
worked out, and that any attempt by European 
nations to take territory and thus introduce or per- 
petuate European ideas of government here must be 
resisted. And this declaration, it must be borne in 
mind, was not simply in reference to the States of 
this Union, but to all the states and nations on this 
continent. When we thus formally and positively 
assert that the Eastern nations must keep hands off 
from this continent, there is an implied promise 
that we will keep our hands off from the other. It 
would be absurd to suppose that either this country 
or other nations understood that declaration to mean 
you must not come on to this continent and take any 
possessions, but we may come on to your continent 
and do as we please. The independence of one was 
a guarantee of the independence of the other. Now, 
entering the Orient to possess it is a repudiation of 
that doctrine, for the moment we enter there and 
appropriate territory, that moment it ceases to become 
us to insist that European nations shall keep off from 
this continent. We cannot either rightfully or suc- 
cessfully pose as a supreme dictator of the world. 
If we ask other nations to respect the separation of 
this continent, we must also respect the separation of 



THE SPANISH WAR. 29 

that. Indeed, the forcible taking possession by us of 
islands in the West Indies or portions of South 
America, while not inconsistent with the Monroe 
Doctrine, seems a good deal like a slur upon it. 
When we insist that the problem of government by 
the people must have free course on this continent it 
seems hardly consistent to say that no European 
nation shall infringe upon that proposition, but we 
may. Not only will the fact of a departure from the 
principles of the Monroe Doctrine provoke challenge 
on the part of European nations, but the possession 
of outlying territories will add to our complications 
with such nations. It is a matter of common knowl- 
edge that European nations are constantly in trouble 
between themselves by reason of differences and 
collisions arising between their respective colonies. 
England and France, England and Russia have been 
again and again on the point of war growing out of 
such troubles. We shall enter upon the same embar- 
rassment and be exposed to all the complications and 
dangers attending. 

Neither is the incorporation of these millions of 
ignorant Malays into our national life as fellow 
citizens, even through the probationary stage of terri- 
torial existence, freighted with less of danger. The 
problem we have sought to work out in this Nation 
is that of government of and by and for the people. 
A great nation upon that principle seems possible /-) 

only under a federal system, a system which x%^a^ '~l^-'^OL - 



30 THE LIBERAL CLUB. 

^'ates all matter of local interest to the several states, 

/and exercises through the national government only 
those powers and functions which make for the gen- 
eral welfare. We have wonderfully prospered in 
administering such system in a compact, continental 
territory, each part of which has been possessed and 
controlled by a race capable of self-government. 
Imagine for one moment the outcome, if in this com- 
pact continental territory all local as well as national 
affairs were determined and administered in the one 
national capitol at Washington. Ignorance of local 
needs would inevitably be followed by the invasion 
of a lobby representing those needs, and Washington, 
which even now is shadowed by the presence of 
enormous and conflicting national interests seeking 
to influence and control Congress, would be turned 
into one vast, monumental lobby camp. 

The safety of government by the people has been 
in local self-government. The town meeting has 
perpetuated the Republic. Thus far the various 
States entering this federal system have been domin- 
ated by a race capable of self-government. Intro- 
duce into that system to-morrow a multitude of States 
whose people are confessedly incapable of self-govern- 
ment and you will bury it beneath the burden of local 
incapacity. A chain is no stronger than its weakest 
link, and a federal system, some of whose links are com- 
posed of States incapable of self-control, will, unless 
all the laws of human action are reversed, break in 



THE SPANISH WAR. 31 

pieces through the weakness of the incapable links. 
We have had territories and kept them in a state of 
tutelage, but that status was continued, not until 
the residents thereof became capable of self-gov- 
ernment, but until the number of the population 
was sufficient to justify assuming the burdens of 
statehood. Territorial organizations, probationary as 
they are, for races incapable of self-government not 
only repudiate the basic thought of the national life, 
but remain a constant and increasing menace to its 
successful accomplishment. Who can tell how many 
centuries must pass before the savage and semi- 
civilized races of these islands become fit to assume 
the responsibilities of self-government ? Is this terri- 
torial period to be permanent ? Who shall say how 
soon the necessities of politics will transform a terri- 
tory into a State ? And when once brought into the 
Union we have links in the federal system so weak 
that a very little strain will snap them. 

In the Union as it stands we have elements of no 
slight danger. We have welcomed the emigrant from 
all parts of the world, and in the cities of the North 
we have an enormous population of the lowest orders 
of European life, unacquainted with and unfit for 
self-government, and a great problem is how to bring 
these unfit masses into a helpful addition to American 
life. In the South we have the rapidly increasing 
colored population, brought here as slaves, emanci- 
pated through the most awful drain of life and money, 



22 THE LIBERAL CLUB. 

elevated in ignorance to citizenship, and every State 
south of Mason and Dixon's line to-day trembles 
before the unsolved question of preserving intelligent 
self-government and at the same time guaranteeing 
rights of citizenship to an ignorant mass. With these 
problems resting upon and burdening the Nation is it 
wise to throw upon it the awful problem of dealing 
with millions far more incapable of and unused to 
self-government? Can we expect to find safety in 
adding to our difficulties? Can we relieve against 
one problem of dealing with ignorant and unfit masses 
here by adding millions more to the problem ? This 
is no trifling question and is not answered by any 
gush about duty and destiny ; in fact, all this talk 
about destiny is wearisome. We make our own 
destiny. We are not the victims, but the masters, of 
fate, and to attempt to unload upon the Almighty 
responsibility for that which we choose to do is not 
only an insult to Him, but to ordinary human intelli- 
gence. We are told we have become so great and 
powerful that the world needs us, but what the world 
most needs is not the touch of our power, but the 
blessings of our example. It needs the bright example 
of a free people not disturbed by any illusions of 
territorial acquisition, of pecuniary gain or military 
glory, but content with their possessions and striving 
through all the abilities, activities and industries of 
their wisest and most earnest to make the life of each 
individual citizen happier, better and more content. 



THE SPANISH WAR. 33 

My friends, two visions rise before me : One of a 
nation growing in population, riches and strength ; 
reaching out the strong hand to bring within its 
dominion weaker and distant races and lands ; hold- 
ing them by force for the rapid wealth they may 
bring — with perhaps the occasional glory, success 
and sacrifice of war ; a wondrously luxurious life into 
which the fortunate few shall enter ; an accumulation 
of magnificence which for a term will charm and 
dazzle, and then the shadow of the awful question 
whether human nature has changed, and the old law, 
that history repeats itself, has lost its force, whether 
the ascending splendor of imperial power is to be 
followed by the descending gloom of luxury, decay 
and ruin. The other of a nation, where the spirit of 
the Pilgrim and the Huguenot remains the living and 
controlling force, affirming that the Declaration of 
Independence, the farewell address of the Father of 
his Country and the Monroe Doctrine shall never 
pass into innocuous desuetude ; devoting its energies 
to the development of the inexhaustible resources of 
its great continental territory ; solving the problem of 
universal personal and political liberty, of a govern- 
ment by the consent of the governed, where no king, 
no class and no race rules, but each individual has 
equal voice and power in the control of all, where 
wealth comes only as the compensation for honest 
toil of hand or brain, where public service is private 
duty ; a nation whose supreme value to the world lies 



34 



THE LIBERAL CLUB. 



not in its power, but in its unfailing loyalty to the 
high ideals of its youth, its forever lifting its strong 
hand, not to govern, but only to protect the weak ; and 
thus the bright shining which brightens more and 
more into the fadeless eternal day. 

Brethren, Ebal and Gerizim are before us. Might 
and right stand on either side with their great 
appeals. 

To every man and nation comes the moment to 

decide. 
In the strife of Truth with Falsehood, for the good 

or evil side ; 
Careless seems the great Avenger ; history's pages 

but record 
One death-grapple in the darkness 'twixt old systems 

and the Word ; 
Truth forever on the scaffold, Wrong forever on 

the throne, 
Yet that scaffold sways the future, and, behind the 

dim unknown, 
Standeth God within the shadow, keeping watch 

above His own. 

We see dimly in the Present what is small and what 

is great, 
Slow of faith how weak an arm may turn the iron 

helm of fate. 
But the soul is still oracular ; and amid the market's 

din, 
List the ominous stern whisper from the Delphic 

cave within, 
"They enslave their children's children who make 

compromise with sin." 



THE SPANISH WAR. -5 

Paraphrasing in part the invocation which attends 
the opening of the Supreme Court, God save the 
Lnited States of America and keep them from the 
road so often traveled by nations, of increasing terri- 
tory, accumulating dominion, rapidly and easily 
acquired wealth, luxurious splendor, a growing sep- 
aration between the poor and the rich, presaging 
decay and death ; and may we always hear the solemn 
prayer of Abraham Lincoln, borne upward to Heaven 
from the consecrated field of Gettysburg upon the 
mighty volume of patriotic incense which ever rises 
from that sacred spot, that government of and by and 
for the people may never perish from the earth. 

God of our fathers, known of old, 

Lord of our far-flung battle line, 
Beneath whose awful hand we hold 

Dominion over palm and pine 

Lord God of Hosts, be with us yet, 
Lest we forget — lest we forget. 

Far-called our navies melt away, 

On dune and headlands sinks the fire ; 

Lo ! all our pomp of yesterday 
Is one with Nineveh and Tyre ! 

Judge of the Nations, spare us yet, 

Lest we forget — lest we forget ! 

If, drunk with sight of power, we loose 
Wild tongues that have not Thee in awe — 

Such boasting as the Gentiles use, 
Or lesser breeds without the Law — 

Lord God of Hosts, be with us yet, 

Lest we forget — lest we forget ! 



IHi. 



